For an unbelievable set of mouthpieces across the whole range of horns, and for being an all-around great guy!!
I'm a recovering classical player with a background in various forms of world music; these days I mainly do pit work, with occasional random gigs in blues/light rock/pop horn sections. On top of that, during the pandemic, I decided that twenty years of faking jazz was more than enough, and started digging in to try to really learn and understand the style and tradition, as well as to develop my own sound. Nobody is going to confuse me for Chris Potter anytime soon, but at least the combo I've subbed with a few times hasn't yet locked the doors when they see me pull up.
Why this self-indulgent mini-bio in the 10mfan vendor section? Because I've also spent a lot of time the past couple of years trying out gear (it turns out that it gets crazy out there once you start considering a range of choices beyond "S90 or AL3, and maybe a V16 if you have to play in a big band"), and Mark has been unbelievably generous and helpful with his time and expertise. On top of that, he makes a DAMN good range of mouthpieces! His tamer models (Alto Madness, Celebration) have been absolutely fantastic for pit work--flexible enough to handle anything I need to do, while still being easy to control, and when it comes to jazz, I haven't been able to find anything that works better for me than the Robusto.
I'm not going to insult the actual jazz players on here by posting any Robusto clips, but here are a couple of excerpts from recent theatre gigs:
Entr'acte of an original production based on The Little Prince (Virtuoso)
Clip from Shipoopi from The Music Man (Alto Madness)
(Also, I've been promising Mark more Virtuoso videos for way too long, and those are still coming--promise!)
Anyway, if you've ever been even remotely curious about one of Mark's pieces, it's definitely worth taking the plunge, especially with this insane sale that's starting up soon--you won't be disappointed!
P.S. Don't tell Mark yet, but I've been prototyping a new model of clarinet mouthpiece...let's hope we can get him to start producing these!
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I'm a recovering classical player with a background in various forms of world music; these days I mainly do pit work, with occasional random gigs in blues/light rock/pop horn sections. On top of that, during the pandemic, I decided that twenty years of faking jazz was more than enough, and started digging in to try to really learn and understand the style and tradition, as well as to develop my own sound. Nobody is going to confuse me for Chris Potter anytime soon, but at least the combo I've subbed with a few times hasn't yet locked the doors when they see me pull up.
Why this self-indulgent mini-bio in the 10mfan vendor section? Because I've also spent a lot of time the past couple of years trying out gear (it turns out that it gets crazy out there once you start considering a range of choices beyond "S90 or AL3, and maybe a V16 if you have to play in a big band"), and Mark has been unbelievably generous and helpful with his time and expertise. On top of that, he makes a DAMN good range of mouthpieces! His tamer models (Alto Madness, Celebration) have been absolutely fantastic for pit work--flexible enough to handle anything I need to do, while still being easy to control, and when it comes to jazz, I haven't been able to find anything that works better for me than the Robusto.
I'm not going to insult the actual jazz players on here by posting any Robusto clips, but here are a couple of excerpts from recent theatre gigs:
Entr'acte of an original production based on The Little Prince (Virtuoso)
Clip from Shipoopi from The Music Man (Alto Madness)
(Also, I've been promising Mark more Virtuoso videos for way too long, and those are still coming--promise!)
Anyway, if you've ever been even remotely curious about one of Mark's pieces, it's definitely worth taking the plunge, especially with this insane sale that's starting up soon--you won't be disappointed!
P.S. Don't tell Mark yet, but I've been prototyping a new model of clarinet mouthpiece...let's hope we can get him to start producing these!
